Research: 2012 Enterprise Applications Survey

We’ve been asking InformationWeek readers about their enterprise application use since 2010, and over the years we’ve seen much the same responses to certain questions.

One in particular jumps out: Survey respondents continue to say that changing, upgrading and optimizing their existing enterprise apps is their biggest challenge. But while the challenges IT pros face remain the same, one change we are seeing is that businesses are increasingly avoiding customization. That’s for good reason, though, as customized apps are more difficult to deal with, particularly when you’re upgrading them.

For their part, vendors are offering more alternatives to customization, providing ways to configure applications for particular needs and industries when they’re initially deployed. But configuration isn’t always the best answer. In some cases, configuration options are getting so numerous and layered that they present challenges of their own.

For SaaS and on-premises software vendors alike, configuration is now the favored approach for letting customers tweak application functionality and add industry-specific capabilities. In some cases, vendors make a point of spotting often-customized features and functions and making them more flexible through configuration settings. But relying on configuration settings doesn’t work for every business.

This report examines the two approaches to fine-tuning enterprise applications and helps identify the best practices that will help you decide whether to customize or configure. (R5010812)

Survey Name InformationWeek 2012 Enterprise Applications Survey

Survey Date April 2012

Region North America

Number of Respondents 338

Purpose To gauge the state of enterprise applications and business processes, as well as organizations’ priorities, in evolving technology over the next 12 months to 24 months.

Methodology InformationWeek surveyed business technology decision-makers at North American companies. The survey was conducted online, and respondents were ­recruited via an email invitation containing an embedded link to the survey. The email ­invitation was sent to qualified InformationWeek subscribers.